Jolla Tablet’s Sailfish operating
system will be unlike anything you’ve
tried before. Once you try it, you’ll
never want to go back. Independent and
open source, change whatever you like, whenever you like.

Does that mean that the version os Sailfish OS running on the Jolla tablet will be fully open source, #unlike the current version ? ;-) That would be indeed very nice and yet another nice feature of the already nice tablet! :)

The wording on the website seems to imply this - independent and open source, change whatever you like (you need the source code for that), etc. - but a clear answer would be welcome! :)

Jolla Tablet’s Sailfish operating system will be unlike anything you’ve tried before. Once you try it, you’ll never want to go back. Independent and powered by open source, change whatever you like, whenever you like.

Power to hackers

Jolla’s core value is freedom of choice for our community. That’s why we’ve picked Intel’s innovation platform, backed by open source, to power the Jolla Tablet. At 32/64GB, the Jolla tablet will have the space and hardware potential to be customised, and if you happen run out, there’s always the option to expand with a microSD memory card.

Proudly open

Sailfish OS is mobile-optimized with the flexibility, ubiquity and stability of the Linux core and a cutting edge user experience built with the renowned Qt™ platform.

Jolla Tablet’s Sailfish operating system will be unlike anything you’ve tried before. Once you try it, you’ll never want to go back. With its second generation, Sailfish OS is more intuitive and beautiful than ever.

Power of freedom

Jolla’s core value is freedom of choice for our community. That’s why we’ve picked Intel’s innovation platform, backed by open source, to power the Jolla Tablet. At 32/64GB, the Jolla tablet will have the space and hardware potential to be customised, and if you happen run out, there’s always the option to expand with a microSD memory card.

Proudly open

Sailfish OS is mobile-optimized with the flexibility, ubiquity and stability of the Linux core and a cutting edge user experience built with the renowned Qt™ platform.

This is the most important question of all. This decides about whether Jolla truly stands for what it says, and seriously contributing to the freedom of its users. Otherwise, it means that they are dishonest, trying to fool their users with false word ... which means, at least for me, that they are strictly to be avoided and even spread the word against. Therefore, this one is the "core" question.

I agree this is a very important question and Jolla should provide an official answer to it. The trust goes in hand-in-hand with promises that are kept and empty marketing jargon (if thats what this is all about) just builds bad reputation and makes it hard to keep on supporting Jolla for veing open and #unlike. At least in the Jolla Phone it is far from truth to claim that "you can change everything" cause the UI is closed, Harbour policies prevent 3rd-pary or user customizations to UI, system apps/functionalites and most of the MW. Jolla should respond to this ASAP to clarify how/when will the Jolla Tablet be truly #opensource-based and more #unlike than the currunt device and OS (and hw drivers and adaptability layer definitely is part of the #SailfisOS as is the UI and MW mobile stack in it's entirety).

4 Answers

As we already learned hard way, those kind of question would not be answered officially. And if even they'll be, you'll never get straight answer. And don't tell me this is not really important/hot topic and that they did not see it. They got most support back then with Jolla start and now, that they are "unlike" (what does it even mean? in UI terms or what???? as most things handled apple/google style anyway) implying that they'll be different from Nokia and do not make those mistakes again, that they are open source friendly and will do it with community. So most answers you can get(not officially) : "soon", "not yet", "working on it" and we depend on "3rd parties".
The new kind of answers are "show me more open operation system", "we use a lot of open source", "we open as much as we can".
But it's funny that while they would not answer those question straight, they'll keep using word "open source" in any opportunity to make good PR and attract users...
P.S. The irony that many fan boys here will say that Jolla is better and more open source friendly than Android, but it would be not true, as we have more source of android and a lot of flavours that are 100% opensource at all. And if you'll tell me that you can't build business with it, OnePlus One can prove you wrong. So yes, we do like Qt more than Java, we do like "real" linux vs Android.
But let's name things what they are.
If marc telling us on video the SailfishOS is opensource while it's not, you can tell me "it will be", but as no roadmaps or any other details shared i smell it's just a promise to quite things down. We already had the promises with silica, and "we'll open it" in alsmot two years become "we'll do it one day"
Even Microsoft learned the lesson and opensourcing .NET and with all irony i think it would be more open source than SailfishOS ever :P

I think the "for profit" argument is misleading. Open source isn't about being "the good guys" and giving everything away as a gift. It is about letting the community contribute to improve the product. Without this, new features keep coming in only very slowly, which I don't think is very sustainable either.

To be honest, when I bought my phone, I was hoping that things would be opened up and we'd see much quicker development of the yet unfinished software. It was a bet on the future, and I'm afraid I've lost that bet in this case.

The "for profit" is just a preface for what follows: they have yet to build a sustainable business model. Once you go open source you can't go back if you realize was too early, so I understand them.
Maybe we can try to propose also ways to build a sustainable business model around a fully open source SailfishOS. Any idea?

In the past Jolla expressed interest in opening everything, but the claim was they won't be doing it right away.

So far very few things were opened from those which were closed at the initial release. I.e. browser UI and social plugins. There was zero progress on the rest and even Silica components remain closed, even though Jolla explicitly said it's supposed to be open. Honestly I have no clue if it's even moving anywhere further and what to expect. It's one of the biggest sore points in Sailfish for me, that's why I'll seriously contemplate whether to keep Sailfish on the tablet or install fully open Plasma Active on it. That would depend in large on the usability of the options.

There is a related thread here which kind of focuses on this topic. I recommend participating in it if you care about this matter.

Where did you see confirmation that it's using Intel's Moorefield chips? They've not released an official statement on that. Given the memory spec (DDR3L-RS), it's actually highly likely it uses Bay Trail, which would mean that there will be open source drivers since it uses Intel's GPU.